


hollowness, that i understand

by hissingmiseries



Category: EastEnders (TV)
Genre: Angst and Feels, Canon Compliant, Late Night Conversations, M/M, Mutual Pining, One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-12
Updated: 2019-07-12
Packaged: 2020-06-27 02:39:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,816
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19781563
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hissingmiseries/pseuds/hissingmiseries
Summary: "You getting in or what?" Ben says, low and casual.Callum blinks at him. "Eh?""Just—going for a drive." They're in the street, moonlight streaming in through grimy car windows.Ben looks tired and pale; for once, the purple swipes underneath his eyes aren't bruises. Callum frowns. "It's one o'clock in the morning."





	hollowness, that i understand

**Author's Note:**

> unpopular opinion but the new ben is the best reincarnation so far and i love him
> 
> i literally churned this out at 2am okay don't expect much
> 
> **contains:** ben/callum, mentions of ben/paul, unrequited ben/jay. canon-typical themes; general ott-ness of the show. mentions of abuse/alcoholism/homophobia, heavy focus on internal homophobia+sexuality. _takes place during the anniversary of paul's death._

-

"You getting in or what?" Ben says, low and casual. 

Callum blinks at him. "Eh?"

"Just—going for a drive." They're in the street, moonlight streaming in through grimy car windows. 

Ben looks tired and pale; for once, the purple swipes underneath his eyes aren't bruises. Callum frowns. "It's one o'clock in the morning."

"Streets will be quiet. I was just gonna—cruise for a bit, you know." He sighs. "You can stay if—" He has that hunted animal look in his eyes, the kind he gets when he's about to lie on a bed of nails.

"No," Callum says, furious and immediate. "I'll come with you."

It's not like he's never snuck out before. Whitney is a heavy sleeper but he scribbles a note every time and leaves it on the kitchen table and it's Ben, okay? It's Ben. Ben who is shivering in the driver's seat, dead-eyed and quiet, the edges of his face eaten away at by shadow.

Callum yawns. "Why now?" he asks. "Most people drive in the daylight, you know."

Ben's mouth makes a thin, stressed-out line. "Need to clear my head."

"Okay," he says. The passenger door opens with a click and he slides in, doused in yellow light; it's cold out but not too bad, the stars disordered and bright in the sky and all the pavements slick with that afternoon's rain. "Is this about—" He means Stuart, or—Jonno. He's been trying not to think of him as _Dad_ , and even more to not think of him as _gone_. Stuart's easier material, at least for now.

"I don't want to talk about him," Ben says tightly. Then, a little softer, "Not yet."

"Okay," Callum repeats.

Ben sticks the car into the gear and kicks the pedal. He's done this before half a dozen times. It's all sort of the same in the end; midnight drive, going on the run. It all blurs together.

It's an old car, but not too old. Modern enough for Callum to hook his phone up to the stereo. He puts on some nondescript rock music and it rattles around the speakers, slams through their heads as they pull out of the Square.

"At least it's not Sister Sledge," Ben huffs. "Or Kylie. Or whatever it is you think us gays listen to."

"This is The Libertines," Callum says. "They're good, all right."

The clock on the dashboard blinks at them like an eye, 01:34 in bright red. "Whatever," Ben says. "Like I'm going to take advice from someone who thought that van wasn't stolen."

A phone rings. _Pam_ flashes across the screen.

Callum frowns. "Do you want me to answer it?"

"No," Ben says, too fast. There's a brittleness about his face and the clench of his jaw that makes him look all washed-out, fragile, like if he touches him wrong he might shatter right there, so Callum reaches out and swipes the name away and that's the end of that.

-

Ben knew he was a Mitchell when he was sixteen, when came out to his dad and the man started crying. Like, actually crying. His face had screwed up and his cheeks went all red and his eyes, the tightness of them—Ben had never seen anything like that before. Then Phil stormed out and drove off, white-knuckled on the steering wheel and that was it. 

The next day after that was the hardest. He was young. The air felt strange on his skin.

You would think it would be easier when he came out, and don't get him wrong, it is. The closet was a nasty place. Inside it was easy to think that nothing outside existed: that if he didn't think about it, he couldn't be hurt.

When he was sixteen, he came out and then he killed a woman. He hit her over the head because she was grabbing at him and his life was falling apart around his ears and suddenly she was dead; one blow, one fall. That easy. He'd been afraid, but mostly he had just been angry.

He had not thought that he had that kind of rage inside of him. Of course he did. He's a Mitchell, isn't he? They're born with it in their veins.

That was probably what saved him in prison, being a Mitchell. Because he'd get up every day and think, _what would Phil do?_ , and that's how he survived. All the beatings and raids and the fights: it took a year or so before he started winning them. His cellmate taught him how to throw a proper punch and to always, always go for the eyes. Barely anyone visited but that was okay, because he didn't want anybody to visit; Christ, that was the last thing he needed. A gay murderer with specs and a hearing aid and a bad temper. It's amazing Phil's name is even still on the birth certificate.

(He thought about them, though, all the time. Lexi and Lola and Jay. 

He thought about Jay in the way of hope, of dreams. Of alternate universes where he got things right.)

Prison was nothing compared to the closet. He went straight back in, shacked up with his best mate's ex but— his skin was awakening; everything about him was stirring, as if from a coma. As though he was a captive in a tower and the dragon had died.

But the dragon was himself, and the knight was this little curly-haired firecracker who walked into his life and it all started again: Phil's scowls and Phil's drinking and Phil Phil _Phil_ growing on him like a tumour, like hands around his throat.

Ben is twenty-three now. He wouldn't care if Phil cried, not anymore.

-

They pull over for petrol and Callum buys them both a coffee.

"I'm more of a tea person," Ben says.

Callum freezes, stricken; "Sorry," he says. "I should have thought—" But he can read on Ben's face that he doesn't mean it, and that he doesn't want to be alone and maybe Callum doesn't want to be alone, either. Before he'd woken up, before he'd stumbled down into the park and sat on that ratty old tyre swing, he'd been dreaming of—the wedding, he thinks, veils and cake and speeches and a dad who isn't—yeah. He doesn't really want to go back there.

"You're alright." He takes the cup and pops off the lid as they get back into the car. Everything is doused in white, artificial strip lighting and the way it falls on Ben's face highlights the pepper of stubble down his jaw, the blue rings of his eyes. The little things Callum sees, when he's looking too closely.

The roads are as quiet as London can be. They take a left and Callum says, "Have you got a route in mind, or are you just, you know. Driving."

Ben sighs, one arm relaxed on the steering wheel like he doesn't care. "I know these streets better than you do."

"Fair enough." Callum forgets, sometimes, that Ben hasn't been there the whole time. That first day they met, when Ben smirked and held out his hand and how he'd almost felt jealous, because he'd never belonged anywhere like Ben did in that pub, at that bar. 

The phone goes again: _Pam_ , buzzing furiously between them. Ben's jaw clenches; it's weird to see him like this, all pulled taut like he could snap at any minute.

Callum reaches down, swipes. "Somebody wants you."

"Yeah, well," he mumbles. "I don't want her."

It's hard not to be nosy. The screen is bright and the _9 missed calls_ stares in accusatory red letters. He says, like how he always said to Stuart when Stu got like this, "If you wanna, like, talk about an—"

Ben scoffs. " _Now_ you wanna talk?"

He isn't Stuart. Stu would never have even tried.

"I know I've been a bit shit," Callum sighs; the traffic light turns from red to amber and the car shakes as Ben revs the engine, twice. "But if you want to, then, I want to." It comes out so matter-of-fact, so casual. He could be ordering his morning latte or buying a paper from the Minute Mart, but Ben knows the tells: eyes go soft, start to wander. That grimace that seems to be a permanent feature of his face drops in place of something more gentle, more curious. "Talk, that is."

Ben gives him a sideways glance, face towards the road and the bath of orange light from the streetlamps. "Yeah, well," he drawls, "forgive me for not trusting you. It's just that every time I seem to give you the time of day, I get battered in a toilet somewhere." Then, more pointed, "or a garage."

The music rolls over to something less drug-fuelled-angst and Callum looks down. Okay, fine. He deserved that one.

-

They hit traffic at 2:12, outside a club that's kicking out for the night. The roads are solid with taxis and drunk students so Callum necks a bottle of water while Ben goes to piss in an alleyway.

His phone, unlike Ben's, has nothing new to share. No frantic _where are you_ texts, no voicemails. It's nice, for once. He could almost play the single man if it weren't for his screensaver, all sharp edges and technicolour. 

"Nice photo," Ben says, with no mirth; it's Whitney, of course it is. She has pink hair and her eyes are very bright and her grin so big, it almost comes off the edges of her face. Callum's behind her, face turned in and pressed to the side of her head with the phone in his hand, the flash a mini supernova in the mirror because apparently they are _that_ couple. It looks alien, looks wrong. Like he's just a shell or some sort of android clutching on, trying to feel human. "You look cute, the pair of yous."

He actually looks like he's about to die of, like, dysentery or something, but it's alright. Whitney is centre-frame and she looks as stunning as ever.

"Come on, then," Callum says, pointing at Ben's phone. "Let's see one of you."

Ben smirks. "What, is my ugly mug not good enough for you in person?" But he's unlocking and flicking through his photo album, interchangeable faces whizzing past. Lots of Lexi, a couple here and there of Jay and Lola and random people Callum doesn't recognise.

He settles on one from what looks like a few years ago. He can't be older than twenty; his hair is darker and his jaw is bare, he's wearing glasses and he looks as liable to mug you as he does to say hello. 

Callum stares. Maybe a little too hard. God, Ben.

"How old even are you?" he asks, peering. "You look like trouble."

Ben laughs. "I was." He swipes across to another one: in the Vic, this time, in a red bomber jacket and a world-ending smirk. "Gawk a little harder, mate, you'll burn a hole in it."

Callum baulks and looks away, too fast. Christ. He'll master the subtle thing one day.

"Sorry," he sighs, but Ben is smiling, and for the first time all night it reaches his eyes. 

His thumb swipes across when he says, "Nah, it's alright," but then a photo comes up that's Ben and some other lad—curly hair and tan skin, someone Callum doesn't recognise. They look pretty close, the guy has a hand around Ben's waist and Ben is looking at him like he hung the moon and all the stars— Oh.

"Sorry," he says again. It feels wrong to look.

Ben sighs and shakes his head and turns the screen off, but it's too late: he has that look in his eyes. Callum knows it: it's familiar. That look you get when you hate yourself, because you've let someone down. And not for the first time. 

There's territory that Callum feels is too raw to cross. Things he doesn't know about Ben yet that he thinks about sometimes in slow, wandering awe, like he can't believe he's real. 

"It doesn't matter," Ben says, reaching across the divider to drop his phone into the cupholder. "I'll be fine."

_I'll be fine._ If he had a quid for every time—every time he'd said that himself. He didn't sound much like Ben, or really at all; Ben makes it sound like he means it, and that's the end of that, no further questions. Callum never got that confidence. And now he's engaged and closeted and he's probably never going to find it, not in this lifetime.

"When did he—" _try again, Cal._ "How long ago was it?" 

Something in Ben's face tightens, like he's weighing up whether or not to throw a punch. Then: "Three years on the dot." 

Ah. Okay. A lot of things are starting to make sense now. That and the fact that there are no marks left on Ben's face but the yellowing just above his eyebrow, that slight bump that doesn't belong there and it kind of hits him all over again; that endless succession of cars every time he sees Ben being punished for who he is. Especially after Paul. Fuck. 

He's not good at this, but he tries anyway. "That's—I'm so sorry, mate," he says. "About everything."

There's no sarky reply. "I know," Ben says, softly, into the distance. "Yeah, I know. So am I."

-

It feels like forever until they cross the river into Canary Wharf. The buildings shapeshift into big millionaire pads with glass walls and white trim. 

Callum yawns; just gone half-two, he'd usually be flat out by now. 

"You can kip if you like," Ben says. It's just started to rain and the incessant pattering on the windscreen isn't helping.

He shrugs. "I'll get another coffee next time we stop. No point me being here if I'm just going to sleep the entire time." Ben sighs. He could be chuckling but—nah, it's probably just the tyres on the road. Callum hasn't seen Ben laugh in a long time. Not since Pride, at least. "So, um, who's Pam?"

He hopes it's not another long-lost Mitchell. He's no shame in admitting how scared of that family he is, second only to his own.

"Old friend," Ben says, as though that ought to explain it. "We were close, a while ago."

He yawns again. "Family friend, or—?"

Ben's mouth twists down at the edges and Callum immediately regrets asking, but it's too late to take it back. "She's Paul's nan. I ain't seen in her a while, but I usually get a text or sommat around this time of year. Looks like she can't sleep either."

"She left?" It's a bit too quick; it's not like Callum can say anything. He ran away to the Army the second things got difficult, where there's no space for anything in your head apart from Queen and country.

"You can't blame her," Ben says, in a voice that makes it clear he's not up for elaborating. "She lost more kids than anyone should. Things got rough after he died but we understood each other, you know, in the end. She was a good mum to him—" and then he stalls out and shakes his head. "Sorry."

Callum swallows. "It's okay." Maybe it's the tiredness but he can feel tears pricking the backs of his own eyes; he's sick of crying. He feels a sponge that's been wrung out too far. "It's good to get it out."

"I bet you're the last one who wants to hear it, though." He sounds acerbic, bitter.

"You can say what you like," Callum says. "Even if you think I don't wanna hear it. It's your car."

"I'm supposed to be keeping you at arm's length."

Callum chews his bottom lip, looks away. He doesn't really want to explain that the last week or so of said arm's-length has been torture. Seeing him in the café, in the pub, peppered in bruises and scabs and drinking himself blind. It hurts but it's not like he can do anything about it, not when Stuart or Whitney seem to materialise every time he gets close.

"Well," he says, "you don't have to. It doesn't have to be like—like _that._ I can be a mate." He pauses, chooses his words. "You can trust me, you know. I promise."

And Ben laughs, a weak little thing. "Okay," he says. "I'll keep that in mind."

-

Pam rings again when they reach Cubitt Town. 

He actually answers it this time, sticks it on speaker and hands it over to Callum who holds it up, under Ben's jaw.

"Pam? What are you still doing up?"

"Hello, love," an elderly voice says down the line. It might be the signal but you can't miss that thick, stuffy sound of someone who's just been crying. "Sorry, I just— I needed to make sure you were alright." 

There's a brief pause. " _Pam._ "

"Are you still in Portugal?"

Ben speaks slowly, tactfully like he's crossing a minefield. "No, I'm back home. I'm back in Walford." A breath hitches, audibly. "Look, Pam, it's late. Go to bed and I'll ring you in—"

"Can you give me your address, please, love?" she asks. "Been a while since I've been back, I forget the way."

"You're coming down to London?" Ben freezes; he turns to ice, right there in the driver's seat. "Is that the best—"

" _Ben_."

"Okay, okay." He reels off an address into the speaker and listens as Pam parrots it back. "Pam, if I ring Les and ask—"

"You won't, though, will you, love?" she says, quite firmly. "Just—I'll see you in a bit, okay? We'll talk then."

"Alright," Ben says. And then, "It's nice to hear from you." He makes a little face, just a tiny twist at the corner of his mouth but Callum knows it too well: he knows it means that Ben Mitchell, god forbid, is telling the truth.

"Aw," Pam sighs. She might be crying again. "It's nice to hear from you too."

-

London is such a big blur of smog and congestion, even at this ungodly hour; the city that never sleeps, eat your heart out, New York. The Army took him all over the world but he's always wanted to grow his roots here, along the oxbow curves of the Thames which they end up following as the clock rolls over to three a.m..

"Do you do this a lot?" Callum asks, out of nowhere. It's been bugging him since he got in. "Is there what you've been doing all week?"

Ben rolls his eyes. "Keeping track, are you?"

"I heard your mum in the café yesterday," he explains. "She's worried about you. Says you're out all night, getting back in at stupid o'clock. She reckons you're out partying or sommat."

It makes him scoff, full of acid. "Not really in the partying mood, if you can't tell."

"If you want," Callum says, "I can tell her I was out with you tonight, that we went down Camden for a drink or sommat. Might, I dunno, calm her down a bit."

Ben shrugs. "Nah, you're alright. Don't want you to have to lie for me."

They both wince, because he already has; a lie by omission is still a lie. Christ, by that logic, Callum has been lying most his life. Every time he touches Whitney, tucks hair behind her ears or kisses her on the cheek it feels like needles on his brain and even then, a lie like that is nothing to the ones he's told to her face. More than once. Sometimes he can't breathe for the guilt.

Ben must sense it. Of course he does—he gets Callum, doesn't he? Gets him far too well. "I don't know why I said you're good at lying 'cause you're really not. How you've lasted this long is beyond me." 

"That's not fair," Callum says, quietly. The zip of his jacket is suddenly very interesting.

"Nah, it's not," Ben counters and he sounds softer, more genuine. "After seeing the state of your lot, I understand. You had to do it to survive."

There's nothing accusatory in his tone but it stills makes Callum bristle, makes all his defences fly up. "That ain't fair either," he argues. "Whitney isn't— I'm not hiding behind her."

"Really," Ben drawls.

" _No._ " 

They shoot down past St David's Square, the river a stretch of murky brown beside them. "I had a girl," Ben says, "for a few years. Serious, too, we were close. And the entire time, I was knocking off Paul." He casts a glance at Callum, who kind of feels like he's trying to fight off an aneurysm. "You ain't the first gay bloke to grow a beard and you sure as hell won't be the last."

"She ain't a—" His veins feel hot. "It's not like I'm just using her to pretend to me sommat else. I liked her long before _you_ came along." This is the worst bit; he's never been good at the talking. "I love her. I honestly do."

The air goes still. Ben sucks his teeth and says, "Just not in the way she wants you to."

It shouldn't be this easy— _he_ shouldn't be this easy to read. He's supposed to be just good old Halfway. Simple, good for a laugh. He's not supposed to have _layers,_ and it sure as hell shouldn't be Ben Mitchell who has to pull them apart. 

"It gets better, you know," Ben says then, and he's looking at Callum with that same look as the day he kissed his cheek and held his hand and told him everything was going to be alright. "At least, after it all dies down. It'll feel like the sky's about to cave in for a few months but as soon as you accept it, and I mean, really accept it—you never want to go back."

"Don't you get sick of all these life lectures," Callum huffs. "You dole them out like bloody sweets."

He shrugs; one-shouldered, loose. "Not if they're what's keeping you going."

The music stops, a welcome distraction. Callum leans forward and puts on another album, something passable before leaning back against the leather seat and watching the skyline whizz past, lights blurring into colourful streaks. Then he sighs, because he never thought he'd see the day where he actually _wants_ to hear Ben Mitchell speak but what do you know, pigs have flown.

"How did your dad react?" he asks. His voice is this tiny little pipsqueak against the echo of guitar riffs. "When you told him?"

It takes so long for Ben to react that Callum's not even sure he heard, but then he chuckles and shakes his head. "He started crying."

His eyebrows fly up. "No shit?"

"Seriously," Ben nods. "Couldn't even look at me for days. That's just the confidence boost you need, isn't it?" 

"Did he like Paul?"

"Couldn't stand him," he sighs. "I kissed him once in the pub and he just walked out. I think he tried, I dunno—he bought him a few drinks, once he realised we weren't going anywhere, but he never accepted it. And then," His voice catches in his throat. "When he told me Paul died, he called him my friend. My _friend_. I decked him. I really could have killed him in that moment, there were no stopping me."

"And—" It feels wrong, grilling him like this, but he can't stop. He wants to know everything. "What about everyone else?"

The car swings up past a garden, woodland enveloping them on all sides. Rare in London, but a welcome sight. "I got lucky," Ben says. "No one else cared. My mum knew before I could walk. Jay's known for as long as we've been mates." He casts a glance over, face green in the new surroundings. "Don't worry, you're not that obvious." 

Callum swallows, rolls his eyes. "You figured it out quick enough."

"Got a good gaydar, mate," he smirks, but then it falls. "I could tell you were keeping a secret. I dunno. I guess you reminded me of me." Callum looks up at him, all wide eyes. "And at that point, it were just a case of two and two."

He has to ask it. "How long have you known," Callum mumbles, into his lap, "that you're into blokes?"

Ben breathes out and takes a corner, but he gives Callum a look that sends shivers down his spine. "How long have you known that you are?"

His mouth feels numb, like it's full of cotton wool. The docks fade into existence ahead of them and the stereo's playing jaunty indie music and Callum thinks, despite it all, this is probably the most relaxed he's felt in years.

-

Another nice thing about London is that the parks have no fences around them. You can stroll around with your dog in the middle of the night and no one bats an eyelid. Or, if you're Ben, you can pull over and open the car door and look over the pavilion while Callum buys drinks from an all-night food truck.

"Got you tea this time," he says, handing over the cup. "Two sugars, yeah?"

"Aw, babe," Ben smirks. "You know my order. We'll be adopting next."

The jokes still sting, even now. They feel like barbed prongs digging into him, taking the piss; it's an annoying flex on Ben's part, one of _oh look, I can say this and no one cares._ "Shut up. What time is it?"

Ben glances at his phone. "Just gone three." 

"Ugh," Callum groans, rubbing a hand over his face. "I've got work in the morning, you know."

"You'd rather dress up a bunch of corpses than ride around with me?" He has that smirk again, the one which kind of makes Callum melt a bit. "I'm offended."

He's stood against the car, Ben in the seat with his feet swung out and on the worn gravel of the track. The park's pretty quiet, all the floodlights throwing swathes of white light onto the grass. A couple of kids are skateboarding and there's a car parked suspiciously in the far distance, rocking slightly which makes them both chuckle when they notice it. 

"Tell you what, though," Callum says. "I never thought I'd end up working there. Not in a million years. What are the chances—out the Army and straight into the undertakers. That's ironic." _Not as ironic as working at your ex's_ , he adds silently. Probably not the best thing to say. 

Ben regards him, careful. "You were supposed to be out defending the motherland, weren't you?" 

"That was— that was the plan, yeah." 

They sit there for a bit, the moon glaring down at them and the stars barely visible for the light. Ben starts picking at grass and watching it unspool in his hands and Callum can't help but watch; all of him focuses on Ben, every sense honed. He wonders when he started doing that.

"You gotta tell me," Ben says, brow furrowed. "That leg injury of yours. Was it real?"

Callum's mouth goes very sour. He looks down at Ben's expectant face and the answer must be all over his own because Ben just huffs, but there's no malice in it. "Blimey," he says. "Maybe you are a good liar after all."

"I've got my reasons," Callum argues.

"Don't we all," Ben says, before turning the key and bringing the car back to life with a roar. "Come on, get in. It's getting cold."

-

It's nearly half-three by the time they start getting near Walford again. The streets feel familiar again, like home.

"I've never seen it so quiet," Callum says, rolling the window down to get rid of the streetlamp reflections. "Quite peaceful."

Ben says, "No such thing in Walford, mate," and picks up the speed when they start seeing road-signs pointing them in the direction of Albert Square. "There's been some shit go down here, you don't know the half of it."

"I'm starting to get the gist." I mean, he did shoot someone on his first day. And not just anyone—the dad of his best mate. During a raid. And then he spent an hour with a tampon shoved up his nose. It was a wild ride.

"I mean," Ben begins, "you are sticking around, right?"

Callum frowns. "Why would I not be?"

He shrugs, eyes locked on the road. "Just—I dunno. Whitney seems like the type who'd make you move into some suburb and get two kids out of you by the time you're both thirty."

"What's wrong with that?" His body shifts to face Ben, the seatbelt stretching around his arm.

Ben just rolls his eyes and gives him a pointed look. "I swear we just spent half the night talking about exactly what's wrong with it."

"There are worst lives, aren't there," Callum says.

"Oh, what," Ben says, and—Christ, he could be spitting venom. "Like me, you mean?"

"No, I never—"

"The fag who gets the shit kicked out of him every other week."

"Ben, that's not—"

It's too late, though. Ben's like a firework; there's no stopping him once he's started, in every sense of the comparison. "If I'm not mistaken, mate, it's mostly your lot that are doing the kicking."

"Nah, mate, that's— you said it weren't my fault, you said that yourself." Fuck's sake, this is Callum in a nutshell, isn't it? Gullible. Taking affection from whoever he can, no matter who it hurts, no matter how it comes back to bite him. "I thought you didn't blame me for that."

He's surprised Ben doesn't draw blood, with how hard he bites his tongue. Every muscle is so tense, hand white-knuckled on the gear stick and then he deflates to half his size and looks so freaking small, it's like watching a split personality. 

"I don't," he says. "I don't, honestly. I just— it all comes back to you, doesn't it?" He looks out the window, at the radio. Anywhere but Callum. "Everything just— all the roads lead right back to you."

He doesn't really know what to say to that. Everything feels all tangled and it hurts a lot and he eventually goes with what he's good at: "I'm sorry."

Ben huffs, and he sounds sincere when he says, "It's alright, mate. Ain't nowt either of us can do about it." He says it in a way that Callum thinks is meant to be reassuring, but it comes out less in control and more shattered. It kind of hits him between the eyes, right then, just how much Ben's been holding himself together in the car, for the past few days.

He'll be damned if he leaves Ben in this state. "There must be something I _can_ do."

"Put yourself first for once," Ben replies. "Even if it hurts someone else."

It's like, the worst possible thing he could have said in that moment. It makes Callum's teeth itch, makes him grimace. "I don't know if I can."

The car slows down as they creep into Walford, headlights dimmed so they don't go blaring into anybody's ground-floor windows. Every curtain is closed, every business locked up and lifeless. He's never seen Walford as a ghost town before but there are quiet moments now and again when Callum wonders just how many spirits are floating around, suspended over passing cars and park monuments. 

The silence makes him look over to meet Ben's eyes. "I meant what I said," he murmurs. "It will rip you apart."

Callum swallows. "I believe you."

"I'll stop," Ben adds. He's leaning closer, like he's just had a shot of energy. "I'll stop with all the digs and the jokes, if it helps. And I know we aren't—" He makes some gesture with his shoulders, a simple little thing but it makes Callum's insides curl with something he doesn't recognise. "—whatever, but you should, um, try and talk to me again." Callum forgets, sometimes, just how much they know about each other. He's told Ben things he's never told anyone, things he'll likely never tell again. "If you want. I promise I can listen without being a prick. I'm not great at it, but I can try." There are bags under his eyes and spilled coffee on the cuffs on his jacket and Callum feels his heart swell, just looking at him; but it's three in the morning and Ben's coming off of a very highly-charged emotional day so _don't get it twisted, Cal_.

He could kiss him, though. Right now. He could lean across the divider and chuck his phone in the back seat and take Ben's face in his hands and kiss him. Like that night in the park, like all the times he's wanted to since. 

But he doesn't. Because—this is them, isn't it? It's all too complicated. It's all too much.

So instead, he nods. He can't suppress the smile that spreads across his face so he looks down, tightens his fist in the fabric of his jacket and says, "I will. I promise."

Ben laughs—humourless, but not as bitter as before. "Don't make promises you can't keep."

"I wouldn't," Callum says. He is so, so quiet. "Not to you."

And Ben doesn't say anything, but the glint in his eyes, the way his mouth turns up at the edges—Callum thinks, or he hopes, that maybe Ben feels it too.

-

Ben drops him off right outside the funeral parlour, unlocks the doors with a click which makes the overhead light come on and nearly blind them both. 

"Hey," he says as Callum starts getting out. It's freezing, the wind's picked up. Whether it's that or Ben's voice that makes Callum shiver is another matter. "Thanks. For tonight. It helped."

Callum smiles a bit, just enough he'll let himself get away with. "Anytime, mate."

Ben smiles back, and there are fucking years worth of words he wants to say behind his teeth but he doesn't say them, because this is Callum, and he's far too much trouble, isn't he? Too many cracked ribs, too many humiliations. Too much time wasted, hoping for something different.

He takes a second, like he's unravelling everything. The park lingers in the background like a phantom and Callum realises that maybe that's his spirit in Albert Square. 

Then: "Just for the record," he says, "I really liked you."

Callum stares.

"In another life, yeah?" 

Then he kicks the pedal and the car disappears down the road, behind the Vic. 

Callum watches him go, watches the brake lights vanish and be replaced by the empty, haunted road. Another life seems a long fucking way away.

-

**Author's Note:**

> i haven't proofread this either so enjoy any typos. come and say hi on [twitter](https://twitter.com/bartonholla) and [tumblr](https://turnerkanes.tumblr.com)! ♡


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